‘He respects women,’ said Connie. ‘He’s definitely not a serial killer.’
They both laughed.
‘And Connie would know,’ said David. ‘She’s an expert.’
‘On teenagers?’
That made them laugh again. ‘No one is an expert when it comes to teenagers,’ David said. ‘Connie’s an expert on serial killers.’
‘Really?’
‘Yep. Ask her anything. Ted Bundy. Richard Ramirez. The Zodiac Killer.’ He pointed to the tattoo on his arm and I realised where I’d seen it before. It was the symbol the Zodiac Killer had sent to the police. ‘It’s a tribute to the victims. A reminder he was never caught.’ That seemed a little odd to me, but before I had a chance to react, David went on: ‘You guys have had some seriously messed-up serial killers across the pond. Like that doctor guy. Harold Shipman. And that dude who kept all those bodies in his apartment. Dennis Nilsen.’
‘I read a great book about the Shropshire Viper too,’ said Connie. ‘Oh, and Lucy Newton. The Dark Angel. She was cool.’
Cool? I thought.
‘It’s not just serial killers,’ Connie continued, settling into a chair and pouring herself a glass of wine. ‘I’m just crazy about true crime.’
‘We both are,’ David said. ‘It’s why we’re here.’ He gestured at our surroundings.
‘What do you mean?’ I asked. I had a feeling I wasn’t going to like the answer.
David and Connie both looked confused. ‘Wait, you didn’t know about this place? Where did you see it advertised?’
‘I don’t know. I put “cabins Maine” into Google and it was one of the first results.’
Connie almost spat her wine out. ‘Really? That’s hilarious. Most people here this weekend saw it on The Snuff Guide.’
‘The Snuff Guide? What on earth’s that?’
‘It’s a dark tourism website,’ David said. ‘You really didn’t know this? You don’t know what happened here?’
‘No.’
‘This is the coolest,’ David said, shoving a veggie burger into a bun and handing it to me. I got a good look at his Zodiac Killer tattoo as he passed it over.
‘We get to tell you about the Hollows Horror,’ said Connie, and she put down her wine and leaned forward, eager to tell me.
Chapter 2
As Connie and David took it in turns to tell me the story of what had happened here almost exactly twenty years before, the hairs stood up on the back of my neck, as if someone were standing behind me, blowing cool air on to me through pursed lips.
‘So, it was July 1999,’ Connie said. ‘The anniversary is this month, in fact. The twenty-sixth.’
‘This used to be a much more basic campground,’ said David. ‘A place to pitch tents or park your RV. None of these fancy cabins. It wasn’t a resort.’
‘It was popular with schools. Like the one that was staying here the week in question. Wendt Middle School, out of Portland.’
‘And it was closed down immediately after what happened.’
‘What did happen?’ I asked. I tried to keep my tone light. ‘Don’t tell me – it was a dark and stormy night.’
‘Ha! Actually, it was a warm, still night, like this. A couple of kids, names of Jake Robineaux and Mary-Ellen Pearce, arranged to meet up after everyone else went to sleep. They were both fourteen, weren’t they, honey?’
Connie nodded. ‘That’s right.’ The same age as Frankie. ‘Jake wrote a book about it around five years ago. Self-published it.’
‘A Night in the Woods,’ said David. ‘That’s the title.’ He was sitting down, barbecue sauce smeared around his lips. He had already finished one bottle of beer and had moved on to the next. ‘Jake said that he found Mary-Ellen in this clearing in the woods, frozen to the spot, pointing her flashlight.’
‘What had she seen?’ I asked.
Neither David nor Connie replied straight away. They were like a veteran rock band who had played their set so many times they knew exactly how to work their audience.
‘Two of their teachers,’ said Connie.
‘Eric Daniels and Sally Fredericks,’ added David.
‘Murdered.’
‘Slaughtered.’
‘Both completely naked.’
Over the next thirty minutes, the Butlers told me, in unnerving detail, what had happened.
Eric Daniels was a thirty-eight-year-old English teacher, married with two children. He was described by those who knew him as ‘a great guy’： bookish but a big baseball fan; a man who was as comfortable doing home improvement as he was debating the finer points of To Kill a Mockingbird. He seemed a little too good to be true to me.